Manuel Antonio

Jaco

volcan poas

The day was rainy and cold at almost 3000 meters. We had to wait 10 - 15 minutes for the mist to clear enough to get a 3 minute glimpse of the lake in the middle of the crater belching sulphery steam. The next shot is saturated a bit to show color through the mist

Jack checking out the "poor man's umbrella"plant

Puerto Viejo

    This weekend we went with Uncle Carlos to Puerto Viejo, which a small town on the Caribbean side of the country, not far from Panama.  It was very calm, mostly pedestrians and bikes...nice to escape the smog of San José for awhile.  The Caribbean waters were beautiful, very warm, muy tranquilo.

On the way:

Small river with the Talamancas behind

Bananas!

    The bus ride took a rather long 4.5 hours with lots of diesel fumes in the face, but we got to see so much of the country.  From the cloud forest mountain ranges to the banana plantations to the agua azul del Caribe. 


Rocking J's, our hostel, was a party place, but it did have lots of space to run around and was a great distance of about 300 feet from the beach.

Jack in our yard; behind is the thatch hut hang-out zone

Our back porch.  Absolutely everything was done
in mosaic- the floors, the walls, todo!

Even the grill is in mosaic!

Uncle Carlos juggling with Sergio the Argentine...

Jack is trying to copy the acrobalancers/yoga praticers
in the yard.

And at the beach:

Lots of vegetation right at the shore

Looking satisfied after a huge meal of Caribbean
red snapper and marinated chicken.

Zoo Ave

      Last weekend we decided to brave the mess of public buses and go to the Zoo Ave and Jack was starting to feel better.  We took one bus to Alajuela, about 40 minutes.  Then we had to search for the next bus, which was supposedly called La Garita, but was instead named Dulce Nombre.  Good thing people are so helpful here.  Another sweaty hour later, we arrived at the largest zoo in the country.

   We did not regret it!  Scarlet macaws were flying over our heads, monkeys chattered everywhere, and we even saw a quetzal.  Jungle plants filled the grounds, many of which were truly incredible.

Peacocks running around the grounds

Scarlet macaws...noisy birds!

Giant bamboo

Flowers like this are everywhere...

Hopefully you can translate this

You can see the spider monkeys near Jack's feet

I think he wishes he was a spider moneky

  

Our digs in San José

Alright, we need to do a few posts to catch up.  San José is really a great city, despite the potholes and rather impatient drivers.  There are tons of plazas, parks, delicious bakeries, etc.  Not to mention great public transportation and pedestrian walkways.
Here are a few pictures of our very nice place at the Costa Rica Guesthouse and our time in San José...

Okay, this isn't our hotel, but there are tons of interesting
buildings like this around the city

Jack and Ben, the son of the hotel owners.  They have so far
had a very enjoyable time throwing legos at each other and watching
Elmo on YouTube.

This is our room...part of it.  We have a king size bed, and
tomorrow we move to a room with our own private balcony!

So many parks...

Behind Jack is one of the great pedestrian-only walkways in town
(minus the occasional cop motorbike or impatient driver)